' So who is the Black Flamingo?'... I reply 'He is me, who I have been, who I am, who I hope to become. Someone fabulous, wild and strong. With or
' So who is the Black Flamingo?'... I reply 'He is me, who I have been, who I am, who I hope to become. Someone fabulous, wild and strong. With or without a costume on.'
The Black Flamingo by Atta is a carefully crafted poetic masterpiece about identity, especially for a Black queer boy. This bildungsroman is deceptively sparse. There is no room for setting or ambience. The main character, Michael (Michalis) takes up all breathing room. It's all about his thoughts, his feelings.
[image] Black flamingo spotted in Cyprus from National Geographic
The book starts simply. Michael introduces himself as the black flamingo. He calls the book a fairy tale where he is the princess and the prince, the king, the queen, the wicked witch, the fairy godmother. Michael is claiming his agency in his joys and transgressions. All his wins and his losses. They're all his to learn from, revel in, build him up. In the first section, Barbies and Belonging, six-year-old Michael just wants a Barbie. Instead, his mother buys him a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle doll. It was heartbreaking to see him wish so loud for what he wants but be told it's not good enough for him. Like parents want to do good parenting according to their conformist standards, rather than their children's unique needs. Eventually, his mother does buy him a Barbie he doesn't want but he's grateful nonetheless, but unlike the turtle, he can't run around with his Barbie. Even acceptance comes with caveats.
The story chooses pivotal moments in Michael's life where he explores what identity means to him. He's gay, he's Black, part Jamaican and part Greek-Cypriot. As a biracial person, he straddles that line where he's too white for Black people and too Black for white people. He never fully belongs. When he meets Daisy, who later becomes his best friend, he finds out she's part Black but she never mentions or talks about it. He doesn't argue with her but believes she's hiding a part of herself.
One thing I appreciated about this narrative is how queerness wasn't treated like something to be ashamed of. In many Black queer stories, the homophobia of our community takes centre stage, sometimes overriding the queerness. Instead of talking about Black LGBT people, it becomes a lecture or soapbox for those among us who are bigoted. It gets exhausting. In 2024, I have to believe bigotry is a choice. There is simply too much information and visibility for anyone to choose to be hateful because of a sky daddy or belabouring colonial talking points while braying that homosexuality is a "Western poison".
In this book, the internalised homophobia of the Black community is discussed. It's part of Michael's fate. He mentions how homosexuality is illegal in Jamaica. In Kenya, it is not illegal but "unnatural acts" are illegal. Many countries that are former British colonies carry these bigoted remnants that current leaders foister on an otherwise wilfully ignorant people. In school, some girls bully Michael and leave Bible verses in his bag. You know them, every fundamentalist's upper limit for critical unthinking: Leviticus 18:22, 20:13. These people of course never read the rest of Leviticus and apply the same energy for instructions against shellfish, pigskin, mixing fabrics etc. Usually I like to fight fire with fire, so instead of trying to engage them in a battle of logics, (logic is chasing them but they keep outrunning it) I prefer to use different verses, gladly cherry-picking the verses that would make them feel the most foolish. Luke 6:37, Ephesians 4:31 and my personal favourite 1 Thessalonians 4:11. I grew up in the Christian church, I am glad I left it.
Michael rebels against the idea that he needs to hide who he is. He is all that makes him. Jamaican, Greek-Cypriot, Gay, Beyonce stan. At no point did he ever dim his light. If anything, he explored how to make it shine and how it best suits him.
When he thought he had feelings for his female best friend, he wrote a poem about it in the back of his math book. His teacher then returned it after an assignment, along with a book where he could write his poetry. There were many subtle moments of powerful allyship. When he wanted a stuffed pink flamingo while on holiday in Greece, his mother insisted on buying one for his sister and a more "manly" gift for him. But his sister gave him the flamingo when they got home. Small moments like that made me tear up. I couldn't help but wonder how many queer Black kids could have lived happily if they'd gotten such soft irrevocable acceptance.
I find this book not just to be a feel-good YA contemporary but also a radical display of queer joy. In Yes Magazine's article about Queer Joy, they state, Queer joy is expressive: a riotous manifesto of self-love. Not just in Pride Month’s publicized moments of queer expression, but in the quiet moments finding and building a community of inclusion and diversity. We see this when Michael goes off to college and finds a Drag community where he can be himself. He can finally become the Black Flamingo.
I could honestly and genuinely write a thesis on the relevance of books like these in the pursuit of Black Queer Liberation, globally. I started reading a paper called Not Yet Queer Enough: Constructing Identity Through Culture by Konstantinos Eleftheriadis where the author mentions how Drag... is produced as the result of a collective decision-making, creating bonds among its participants, and finally constituting a source of tension. Its external function in particular is crucial for the articulation of the collective identity ‘between members of the different groups who gather to participate in the event on the one hand, and the larger community, on the other. For his first drag show, Michael performs a poem, in it he states
I call myself black. I call myself queer. I call myself beautiful. I call myself eternal. I call myself iconic. I call myself futuristic.
And before this affirmation, he admits I felt queerness made me even less black. But queerness extends beyond the binaries of existing and ostracism, legal and illegal. It's not a matter of debate, rather it's about freedom. 12-year-old me needed such a book in her life that told her being queer is ok, not something to be threatened with an exorcism over. But that's a story for the woman with the black (and white) cat. Please read The Black Flamingo....more
This is a lovely collection of poems that the author describes as "the process of falling in love". Some poems have a soothing simple complexity such This is a lovely collection of poems that the author describes as "the process of falling in love". Some poems have a soothing simple complexity such as A Wild Love. Others were so saccharine I'm surprised I didn't get diabetes. And others are just my type of whimsy.
Who best to give your kiss to, Thank to a lovely cup of coffee, when you are single? What happens between you and your cup of coffee, Remains between you and your cup of coffee
The book is divided into three parts Season of Love, Falling Apart and RISING AGAIN: "the Phoenix. Which are pretty self-explanatory. My copy had some very beautiful illustrations as well and the cover is just divine.
My favourite poem was A Grand Hall
If you ever manage to open it, You will find a grand hall of darkness. Look for me there... Where your heart echoes mine.
It's emo, dramatic af and speaks to the vantablack abyss of my soul.
Thanks to the author for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review...more
What sphinx of cement and aluminum bashed open their skulls and ate up their brains and imagination? Moloch! Solitude! Filth! Ugliness! AsLook at this:
What sphinx of cement and aluminum bashed open their skulls and ate up their brains and imagination? Moloch! Solitude! Filth! Ugliness! Ashcans and unobtainable dollars! Children screaming under the stairways! Boys sobbing in armies! Old men weeping in the parks! Moloch! Moloch! Nightmare of Moloch! Moloch the loveless! Mental Moloch! Moloch the heavy judger of men! Moloch the incomprehensible prison! Moloch the crossbone soulless jailhouse and Congress of sorrows!
Why the fuck am I falling in love with dead white authors? ...more
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